What is the best project management software for small creative teams?
We recently compiled a list of 26 project management tools "the most common use tools on web" perfect for marketing and creative agencies.
Karola Karlson , Karola is a marketing manager with project management skillsIt features: 26 tools with their top features, specialties and pricing
I'm positive you'll find some amazing options from the list: 26 Project Management Tools for Creative and Marketing Agencies
To name a few:
1. Active Collab
Active Collab outlines all projects on a simple dashboard, bringing structure to creative project management.
2. Scoro
Scoro combines project management with CRM and billing so that agencies need one tool instead of five different ones.
3. Harvest
Harvest breathes new life into marketing agencies’ time tracking and billing processes, making it easier to bill customers based on completed projects.
4. FunctionFox
With a simple user interface and helpful project management features, FunctionFox has all it takes to make a great marketing project management tool.
5. 10,000ft Plans
10,000ft Plans is a visually oriented project management application with strong suites in resource planning and forecasting.
6. DoInbound
DoInbound is designed specifically for inbound marketing agency project management, helping to streamline campaigns, deliverables, and tasks in a beautifully designed system.
7. Teamwork Project Manager
Teamwork enhances team collaboration and helps creative teams to organize their work and tasks.
8. Advantage
Whether you’re a digital, marketing, full service or in-house agency, Advantage will help run your office with many helpful features.
9. iMeet Central
iMeet Central helps to organize files, projects and communications in a centralized work environment.
10. TrafficLIVE
TrafficLIVE has the mission to free agency teams’ time for the thing they do best – creative projects.
Do check out the complete list for a detailed overview of 26 PM tools – it's super helpful!
26 Project Management Tools for Creative and Marketing Agencies
Here’s a list of 34 PM software for creative teams, if you want to get a thorough overview.
However, for a small creative team I would suggest:
Scoro
Scoro combines project
management with CRM and billing so that agencies need one tool instead
of five different ones.
Top features:
- Projects with tasks and deadlines
- Project scheduling mode
- Customizable project management dashboard
- Detailed reporting and tracking metrics
- Time entries and billing for time
- Invoices and quoting with pre-set templates
- CRM and sales pipeline management
- Client and billing data attached to each project
What’s special about
this tool: Scoro is more comprehensive than many other task and
project managements tools, including CRM and billing features. It is
perfect for agencies that need to frequently bill their clients for work
and projects.
Pricing: from $22 user/month for complete
agency management
Trello
Trello is known for visualizing project tasks on a cardboard-like dashboard that’s great fo managing short and quick everyday assignments.
Top features:
- Task management on a cardboard
- Creating multiple task lists
- Attach pictures and files to tasks
- Organizing lists by dates or priority
- Commenting on cards
What’s special about
this tool: Trello has a highly visual interface, making daily task
management fun and intuitive. It is great for small teams with no
complex projects.
Pricing: Trello is a free tool, with
extra cost of $5/month for Trello Gold
Asana
Asana combines
elements of project management, file storage, and collaboration and
helps to manage projects across a team without email.
Top
features:
- Projects with multiple users, tasks, and subtasks
- Real-time interaction with team
- Commenting under projects and tasks
- Notifications about projects updates
- Attachments under projects
- In-app inbox for faster communication
What’s special about
this tool: Asana is a really easy-to-use tool with a simplistic
layout. If you’re a small team with unsophisticated projects, check it
out.
Pricing: Free for up to 15 members, Premium from
$8.33 user/month
There are several hundred project management tool if you search it on the search engine but which one is the best depends upon your business needs. The project management software that works the best for the small teams will be the one that comes in minimum/or no cost at all, and provide maximum features for team collaboration.
Here are the few tools I find the best for small creative teams:
nTask is an all-in-one, online task management software created for solopreneurs and teams alike. Comprising an intuitive interface, this tool holds a variety of modules neatly placed together with options for multiple views.
Primarily a task and project management tool, you can use nTask to store just about any information through its activity checklist and team management feature sets. This makes it perfect for project managers working on basic to enterprise level projects.
It has a short learning curve and a clean look, which makes it easy to work with for everyone from homemakers, small teams, remote teams and freelancers.
Price: Free and $2.99/user in PRO plan.
If you love Kanban boards and need a crisp but focused interface without having to go through too many features that you can easily skip, give Quire a go. It happens to be designed primarily for creative teams, its features can be equally useful for other professions as well.
From ideation to completion, give your projects a brand new workflow through unique tree structures and transparent team collaboration.
Price: Free
Asana requires no formal introduction in the suite of project management tools. It encompasses a vast set of capabilities for use by single users and teams alike.
Asana lets you make the best of task and project management while giving teams transparent channels to collaborate and communicate effectively. Team members can easily collaborate with each other on the work at hand through comments, likes and follow options.
Price: Free plan. $9.99/user in PRO plan. Customized Enterprise plan.
Note: I would love to hear Quora Community thoughts on the tools I have included in the answer.
Every year new tools are launched in the market. Some live up to the expectations while others are forgotten as soon as they were launched. Project management tools are always in the limelight either for introducing new features or integrating several useful tools in one app.
Let’s talk about some project management tools that performed incredibly well in 2018 and will continue to do so in 2019 as well.
1. ProofHub
ProofHub is an all-in-one project management tool. It comes packed with powerful features to eliminate the need of having too many different tools to run your business. It acts as a centralized place for all your projects, teams, and communications. It makes it easy to create plans, collaborate with teams and clients, keep things organized and deliver projects on time.
2. Troop Messenger
Troop Messenger is a comprehensive instant messaging app that works well for both small and large businesses. You can participate in productive team communication without ever leaving your seat. You can collaborate with audio calls, video calls, screen-sharing, group chats, and other amazing features. The best thing is that it seamlessly integrates with popular third-party applications.
3. Taskworld
Introduce your team to a visual way of tracking work, sharing ideas and measuring performance with Taskworld. It is a dynamic project and task management software that makes planning, delegation, and collaboration a breeze for its users. It combines a sleek design with power-packed features for better task management and team communication.
4. Monday . com
If you’d like to plan, organize, track projects in one collaborative space, monday - team management software | monday.com could the right tool for you. Manage any workflow or process and be ready to address any challenge from the simple to the not-so-simple with total ease. Keep up to date with where everything stands and plan for the future with an easily digestible overview.
5. Asana
Whether small or complex projects, Asana is an effective tool for tracking and managing team’s projects. Unlike other project management tools, Asana comes with an intuitive and simple UI. Task prioritization helps teams to be more productive and efficient and all the changes are updated in real-time.
6. Genius project
Genius project comes with a wide range of powerful features that covers almost every aspect of your business. From project planning to resource management, Gantt charts to time tracking, team collaboration to budget management — it takes care of everything.
7. Scoro
Scoro is an end-to-end business management software solution for professional and creative services that help to streamline work and eliminate routine tasks. Leading companies such as Newton, Grant Thornton, WSI, and many others are using Scoro to get work done, be organized, and be in control.
8. Basecamp
Basecamp is one of the most trusted project management and team collaboration tools trusted by hundreds of people. Not only it just helps you to get work done in one place but it also offers a calm and organized way to manage projects and other work commitments. Communication around the tasks and sharing new ideas is easier, more transparent, and faster.
9. Trello
Whether it’s a big project, business report, planning your next vacation, Trello lets you organize anything in a fun and flexible way. It is incredibly easy to use and keeps track of everything, from the big picture to the minute details. Trello easily integrates with various productive apps to help you stay productive and on top of things.
10. Quire
If you’re someone who likes to work with to-do lists and break tasks into goals, then you must try Quire. It’s the best collaborative project management software for breaking down goals in hierarchical lists. In Quire, you can easily kick start a goal by picking out critical tasks, visualize, and complete them in Kanban board without losing the big picture.
11. Wrike
Wrike is a leading project management software that simplifies planning, gives full visibility, and streamlines workflow. Centralize communication with stakeholders while maintaining full context and turn strategy into an actionable plan to achieve success. Wrike lets you keep priorities straight and goals in sight. You can also customize dashboards so you only see what you want to see.
In my experience of managing small and large design/dev teams, the best PM tool for you will be based on your business’s culture and specific requirements, rather than the application with the most advanced features.
I’ve extensively used Asana, Jira, Trello, Podio and Basecamp (five of the most established products in the market). I’ve learnt the hard way that this is far from a ‘one size fits all’ situation.
At their core, all PM tools help provide a centralized location to manage your projects and the tasks, conversations, deadlines, documentation and resources within the them. But each tool is grounded in a different philosophy. Understanding this is key to ensuring you select the most appropriate solution,
Here are a few questions to guide you towards the right choice:
DOES YOUR TEAM HAVE MUCH PM TOOL EXPERIENCE?
If your team has rarely worked within a cloud based project management environment, there will be friction as they resist the change (it’s human nature!). Without the resources to invest in training, you should select a product with a gradual learning curve and fast built in support.
There are two obvious choices here:
Trello, grounded in the Kanban style of project scheduling initially developed by Toyota, is the simplest interface to master. Think of it as digital Post-It notes on a whiteboard. Tasks are progressed by moving them into different buckets (also called lanes). The UI is tactile, and serves as a great entry point for teams making the transition to online Project Management. This drag and drop interface also resonates with visually-oriented people like designers.
Asana uses another framework that will be familiar to most employees: the ‘To Do List’. Conversations and task documentation all sit within items that are checked off when complete. The customer support for Asana is comprehensive: from thought out tool tips to a help desk with same day email support.
On the other end of the scale, Podio’s interface is loaded with features and far less intuitive. This makes it a less appealing choice for an inexperienced team.
I’ve put together the scale below, displayed after each question, to help you visualise the relative merits of each PM tool.
DO YOU NEED YOUR PM TOOL TO INTEGRATE WITH OTHER APPS?
If you intend to integrate your chosen PM tool with other applications, such as time tracking or invoicing, then 3rd party support will be critical. Effective integration can save you moving between different tools to keep things synced. I’ve used Asana’s integration with Harvest to consolidate my time tracking and task management into one place.
Because we are focusing on the most established platforms, the level and quality of 3rd party app support is high across the board. Jira, Asana and Podio lead the race with support for almost 50% of the most popular applications.That’s around 70 different integrations! Trello and Basecamp support 30% of the popular app ecosystem.
WILL YOU BE MANAGING SOFTWARE RELEASES IN YOUR PM TOOL?
Project Management tools have very broad applications across all industries. The tools discussed so far are suitable for most teams. If your primary need is software development however, you will benefit from a tool that has integrated support for Scrum or Kanban boards.
As noted earlier, Trello uses the Kanban framework, which is perfectly suited for software development. Though it’s simplicity is appealing to small teams, larger teams will quickly outgrow it.
This is where Jira steps in. It is very well established and comes with the support and stability you expect from the Atlassian family of products. Jira’s Agile module has full support for the popular Scrum and Kanban methodologies.
While Asana, Basecamp and Podio can be used for Software Development, you will find yourself using 3rd party apps or workarounds. Possible, but not ideal. It’s important to note that there are many smaller PM tools built specifically for software development. We will cover these in an upcoming article.
DO YOU NEED TO COLLABORATE WITH YOUR CLIENTS?
As you grow more familiar with your project management tool, you will find that it’s not just co-workers you’ll want to collaborate with. Sharing projects with clients and other external stakeholders can be a great timesaver. But without the correct user permissions framework, it can also be a recipe for disaster.
Basecamp splits projects down the middle with a client section and a team section. This is a great way to bring client discussions into your PM tool, while ensuring that the client doesn’t see anything you don’t want them to. This approach also makes the experience more manual, as you have to push specific information to the client. Asana, Jira and Podio operate on a similar principle, where guests only see what you explicitly share with them.
Trello’s ‘observer’ feature allows you to give read only access to clients. It’s a less time consuming approach – but it does expose all your team’s comments.
HOW COMPLEX IS YOUR TASK FLOW?
There is nothing more frustrating than not being able to correctly articulate a set of requests due to feature limitations. If you will be working with complex multi-level tasks then you need to pick the PM tool that will enable you.
Both Asana and Jira have been developed with complex tasks in mind. Sub-items can be easily created, managed and discussed.
Podio achieves the same objectives but in a less elegant fashion (that really is the Podio story in a nutshell).
Trello’s visual UI favours simple tasks – and it does this beautifully. While there is support for more advanced features, these clutter the overall experience. Basecamp has also opted to keep things simple and does not offer sub-tasks.
HOW SCALABLE IS THE PRICING MODEL?
The investment you make in selecting the most appropriate PM tool is more than just monetary. Even once you have made your decision, you and your staff will invest time and resources into preparing and familiarising yourselves with the platform.
Trials, costs and pricing models vary between each platform. Most platforms use a model that blends ‘Users’ and ‘Features’. This can make comparison and selection a difficult process.
Let’s consider the total cost for two teams:
- a light usage 15 strong team that only uses basic features
- another team of 30 members that requires the full feature set
Asana provides a very functional version of the product entirely free for up to 15 team members. The limitations of this free version are few. The prices for full access scale up from $4 to $8 per user, as team numbers grow.
- Light access for a 15 member team would cost nothing!
- Full access for a team of 30 would set you back $208 per month.
Trello was designed for smaller teams and individuals and it’s pricing model reflects this. Like Asana it offers a limited version of the product. Unlike Asana there is no user cap on this. You are only charged if you require access to the application integrations like Evernote or Salesforce.
- Light access for 15 member team would cost nothing!
- Full access for a team of 30 would cost $299 per month.
Basecamp updated their pricing to a flat rate of $99 a month. This makes it expensive for small team and very cheap for large teams….
- Light access for a team of 15 would cost $99 per month
- Full access for a team of 30 would cost $99 per month.
Podio packs a heavy set of features including workflow management and digital signature support. The full access price reflects this loaded feature set.
- Light access for a team of 15 would cost $108 per month
- Full access for a team of 30 would cost a hefty $570 per month.
Finally, Jira’s pricing is heavily customisable based on needs and, in my opinion, it is overly complex.
- Light access for a team of 15 would cost $75 per month
- Full access for a team of 30 would cost over $300 per month, depending on add ons.
Ultimately, value for money comes down to your requirements and team size. Startups will probably find Asana and Basecamp as the more viable options here. Trello if you are bootstrapping your business!
Best of luck with your project and don’t hesitate to reach out to us at Scalable Path for project management assistance or tech freelancers.
By now you’ve probably figured out that there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ when it comes to PM software.
Companies have way too many different needs, requirements and budgets in this respect. But if you want to manage the nitty-gritty of a small creative team while also keeping an eye on the big picture, I recommend using Paymo. Full disclosure: I work here.
As an intuitive end-to-end PM platform, Paymo allows you to manage projects through their entire cycle without having to use a suite of apps. You can make use of the different task views to edit and organize information depending on your needs. Hence:
- Simple View - Offers you a CRUD like method for adding and editing tasks
- Table View - Allows you to organize or hide different attributes of a task
- Progress Board - Helps you visualise your workflow through different stages
- Gantt Chart - Highlights the start and end date of a task, its duration and the dependencies between it and other tasks of the same project.
Paymo also gives you the opportunity to schedule your team’s work in advance, so that you can see who’s over - or under-booked and available for future projects.
Don’t worry about delivering projects on time, since you can track your time through the online web timer or the desktop and mobile apps. Alternatively you can add it manually too and export it through time reports, in case you need to share the project progress with your clients.
You can even generate invoices, track expenses and create estimates so that you can cut back on admin work and manage everything from one place.
Bottom line is this: try it with your team and see if it fits your workflow. The trial is free for 15 days so enjoy the testing!
Below you have some in-app screenshots for a better feeling of it:
Simple & Table View
Progress Board
Gantt Chart
Resource Scheduling
The definition of a Project Management varies significantly, especially when it comes to creative projects. So, before I suggest, what in my opinion is a really good project management software for creative and design teams, let me start with talking about what most businesses need to accomplish with it.
Unlike businesses where the project planning and methodologies tend to remain more or less the same from one project to the next, projects that involve design and creativity evolve and change over time. In most cases they can even switch directions completely half-way into the project. In such a scenario, it’s important that project management remains flexible while retaining the core essence of the project, it’s structure, time and budget.
The Project Managers need to be ready and willing to coordinate with the Creative Project Lead and other team members. Yes, collaboration and coordination are the need of the hour when it comes to choosing the best project management software for small creative teams.
Just a few of the many functions that creative teams need to accomplish with a good project management software are:
Communication:
Communication is the key to success of every creative project. When it comes to managing creative projects, very often project management evolves into a strategy of diplomacy and sometimes a practice of the good cop vs. bad cop routine. It’s crucial that the Project Lead and the Project Manager are able to communicate effectively on the various aspects of project management. This allows the team to find the perfect balance of delivering a constraint (for example, limited time) with an opportunity (for example, ability to improve the design by focusing on high-level changes).
Setting Scope and Introducing Constraints:
Creative projects always require constraints. And it’s expected of the Project Managers to help frame these constraints and lay the groundwork for successful projects. Setting time and budget constraints help create the initial framework for projects that could otherwise continue, quite possibly, for ever. At the start of any project, the Project Manager needs to help balance the project scope and get consents from team members. A good project management software for creative teams should enable setting the scope to be much easier and hassle-free.
Collaboration:
As the project moves along, the team will need to send updates to the rest of the staff on client satisfaction, milestones, timeline, and a topics of interest. This is also beneficial in cases where two projects are encountering similar challenges, so that the teams can help each other or share valuable knowledge on how to successfully resolve similar issues.
Scheduling and Time Management – You should be able to keep track of time on various tasks and as well as team members’ work schedule into account.
Resource allocation – A crucial part of every project management, that makes sure that team members are working on the right things.
Project budgets and cost of resources – Once again, you should be able to keep a close watch on ballooning project costs, and keep a real-time check time, as well as the allotted budget
Documentation & Files – The project management tool should allow for easy documentation of all requirements, and design and knowledge files.
Simple and easy to use - The software should make it easy for you and your team to get started right away, without getting lost in the intricacies of the interface.
Configurable – The tool should support the company's preferred style of working and implementing relevant project methodologies, creating schedules, allocating people and managing resources.
With all these factors in mind, I would like to recommend ProProfs Project – an easy to use online project management tool that gets all these things done!
Some of the features that I absolutely love about this tool:
- SaaS based software, so doesn’t require any software installation
- Allows you to meet project deadlines faster
- Allows collaboration with multiple teams easily
- Allows creating task dependencies
- Allows sharing files, discussion and comment on projects, and more.
Some of the project features:
Get organized in minutes
The simple and intuitive, drag and drop functionality allows you to arrange the tasks in the order of priority and set the status with the traffic light indicators so you can focus on what’s important.
You can easily create sub-tasks and split your projects in to manageable items and get organized better. It's a tool startups will love to use.
Manage teams better
With this ProProfs simple project management software, you can collaborate with multiple teams, invite them to projects and assign tasks to various team members. You can also decide the relevant permissions to give them, like a project manager with full admin controls or simply a guest access with read only permissions. The hierarchy allows your team to get a lot more work done in much less time.
Automation
A common ailment that all projects suffer from is recurring tasks that use up a lot of valuable time. With ProProfs Project, a single click of a button allows you to automate a lot of these tasks. Talk about being productive!
Project Views
Several views like calendar view or Gaant Charts will let you visualize all of your projects, tasks and sub-tasks, and milestones quickly and easily. You can also sync your milestones with your main calendar tool, like Outlook, iCal or Google Calendar.
Easy Collaboration
You can discuss projects, tasks and subtasks, and files with the entire team or a just a select few members of the project. Replies to your email notifications and further replies will be automatically threaded to the comment, meaning users don't even have to log in to collaborate.
Single place for all your files
Attach relevant files to projects or tasks and discuss them with your team, or client. Files are stored in the cloud for safe, secure and fast access.
Create Gantt Charts
If you prefer to show your milestones in a Gantt chart, then use our Timeline report to create a clear, visual and accurate display of your milestones which you can then share.
Measure your progress
With powerful reporting functionality, you can create beautifully designed reports with charts and graphs that show project progress, the most active tasks and your most important metrics. The reports can also be shared with people outside of the system with a secure URL that you can share directly.
I suggest you check out this all of the features of this awesome (and affordable) tool here – ProProfs Project, for simple project management.
Disclaimer: I currently work for ProProfs and would like to recommend that you try out ProProfs Project that comes with a free trial so you can check out all it’s features. This is a product that has been built with our underlying philosophy of delighting customers.
I get
it…
I’ve worked with hundreds of small creative teams over the
years and can empathize on your journey to find a suitable project
management tool that covers all your agency needs.
Functionfox offers simple time and project management tools designed specifically for creative teams. In fact, FunctionFox began as one creative agency’s solution to internal time-tracking and project management challenges.
We Are Industry
experts
Our team of industry success consultants
are committed to being a valuable extension of your business. With
free support we’re committed to offering personalized
email/phone/webinar support from a real person.
You can read about how much our customers love us
Improve your
workflow
Don’t let deadlines and due dates slip
past. Our easy to use production schedules, calendars, project email
alerts, and progress reports help you keep everything on track.
Resource
Capacity
Check your team’s availability and know
whether your team can take on additional work, or if additional
resources are required. You can also create personalized To-Do Lists for
your team so you can keep those traffic meetings short and sweet.
Centralize your
communication
Communication a challenge? You
need our internal project blogs to keep everything in one place
(including files and project requests), and everyone on the same page –
even when you’re juggling multiple jobs.
Understand your business
better
Our advanced reporting capabilities with
flexible, comprehensive reports, interactive charts, and CEO Desktop
help you easily view and analyze key data metrics.
Hope that helps!
You can learn more about FunctionFox here
Disclaimer; I work at FunctionFox
Nothing has the functionality of Mavenlink (Online Project Management Software). Mavenlink is founded on best practices used at firms like Accenture. The reason for this is because the founders are all ex-Accenture alumni. No matter how big your agency is Mavenlink can help make it more efficient and more profitable. We actually have many case study’s that talk about how agencies have grown using Mavenlink.
Let me introduce you to the only solution built by service delivery professionals, for service delivery professionals.
Take Control of Time And Expenses
From tracking time to approving it, Mavenlink makes it easy and intuitive to input those financial details — allowing you to keep your focus on delivering great work.
Plan and Optimize Resources
Gain visibility and control over resourcing. See who’s available by skill and capacity and understand how much work they can take on. You can even forecast resource needs and shift resources to meet goals.
Manage Projects and Time
Build projects and manage timelines, and then track your project health, status, and burn in real time. Approve time directly in Mavenlink, share statuses with clients, and keep everyone on track.
Monitor Performance
See performance at both the project and portfolio level. With powerful analytics and custom reports, you drill down for detailed answers. Drive growth strategically when all your resource, project, and profitability metrics are in one place.
- Planning our weekly agenda
- Collaborating with our partners
- Product development
- Brainstorming
- Tracking our assumptions
I use the board for my personal task-management, which helps me during update meetings but also in my personal life, but there are also other, more interesting ways to use Trello:
- Weekly calendar - each day is a list with cards for events / appointments / things to remember etc.
- Housemate coordination - for updates on chores, shopping lists, house guests, dinner plans etc.
- Booklists - long list of books to read as described in this post about how to read lots of books
- Job-hunting - to list all opportunities as they progress in the pipeline along with contact information, expectations, feedback etc.
- Comparing items - if you want to buy a car or a TV and want to compare a bunch of models with different specs
- Blogging - can plan and schedule posts!
(This is an excerpt from my blog post: t If you're a to-do list kinda person, read this)
The best project management software for small creative teams is ProfitBoard.
This is considered the very best because of some of its following features,
Keeping track of all the employee's work & salaries can become easier with timesheet management.
Along with managing the cash, one needs to keep a close check on the costs. The expenses and new investments during the initial few months should not be too high.
Financial
Analytics
Analyse & know how much to spend in every aspect
of your business from marketing channel performance, ads performance to
project-wise profit everything in a jiffy only with ProfitBoard.
Budgeting &
Forecasting
Budgeting is the backbone of every start-up.
Foresee cash crunch before get sunk in the debt ocean. From simple
to complex budgeting do everything with ease.
Financial Decision
Making
Get reports like cash in hand, days to get paid, when
to pay debt, impact of loan on cash flow with just one click for an
effective & profitable decision making and to avoid any adverse
situation.
Alerts &
Advices
Get real-time notifications to pay credit card bills,
attend meetings, send quotations to clients etc. on a single dashboard
anytime & anywhere. Also get advices about investment, loan
etc. to escalate the business value.
Calendar view of
cash flow
Know how much will expand in which day of a month
& when the expense goes beyond average cash balance beforehand to
brace yourself.
There are many great project management apps out there and it’s very hard to say which is the best since this depends on your budget and needs, but for a small team I recommend you Slack or WunderList.
With Slack you can create conversation channels that can be either open and accessible to everyone, or private in case you need to discuss sensitive information with only some of your team’s members. Members can also send direct private messages in order to communicate among each other. Slack has a user-friendly interface with a great drag & drop function and uses hashtags to organize information better. Slack has a free plan that includes nice features for a very small team. However, if you want more you will need to upgrade to the Standard plan that for $6,67 per month removes limitations, doubles the storage space and allows group calls.
WunderList is a great time-management app for personal use or small teams. It allows team members to collaborate by sharing their lists and make comments and notes. With WunderList you can set due dates and reminders so you will never miss a deadline or an important event. WunderList is a free app but it can be upgraded to the Pro version, which removes all the storage, to-dos and sub-tasks restrictions for $4.99 per month.
I recommend you to read about 6 Key Team Management Apps for Entrepreneurs in order to find out more. Good luck!
This looks like exact scenario we were thinking about when we created AllDone.io. There are many tools for managing project, but they are often big and complicated to use, and very often ignore the fact, that people just want simplicity and a tool that will improve the project output. We build a tool for Scrum teams (which is most popular and successful management framework for creative teams.
We have full Scrum feature set:
- Backlog management
- Sprint Planning
- Estimations (optional)
- Scrum Board
- Reporting: burn down chart and velocity reeport
- User management
It is straightforward to use. Team love its simplicity. And the Scrum process is very easy to use and proven successful by thousands of teams so far. You can try free demo and run a free trial Sprint at AllDone.io.
I highly recommend Need To Do It.
This is a great new tool that is killing it right now. They’re working under a private beta so you’ll need to request access.
I came across this tool through a recommendation from a delegate I met at a tech event in Denver and I’m so glad I took a stab at it. I now use it as one of my ‘go-to’ tools when consulting with clients on their marketing, lead generation and sales strategies, both for small teams and large corporations. It’s the versatility in this software that set’s it apart in my opinion.
Project management software must be simple, clean yet highly effective. That’s precisely what this is. It works as a to-do software with the standard to-do list capabilities that you’d expect, but with advanced features which also allows you to run this as a task management, and a complete project management tool. This is the versatility I was talking about.
Here’s a snapshot of some of the features:
- To-do lists
- Tasks and subtasks
- Notifications and reminders
- Cross platform/user collaboration
- Voice control
- News feed
- Calendar sync
This is a just a few of the features. I want to highlight just a couple that my clients and I am utilizing:
- Notification & reminders / calendar sync
You’re able to sync Need To Do It to your iCal, Gmail, Outlook etc so everything is relayed over to your calendars for quick snapshot viewing and to put in with any other business you have to maintain.
It’s quite easy to forget to-do certain things when working on a project. With reminders, you’ll never forget anything. You can set date and time reminders or location reminders. Very handy to ensure everything gets done.
- Tasks and subtasks
When you create a task, it often takes a number of little tasks and to-do’s in order to complete the whole task. That’s what this feature is for, to make sure you can pinpoint everything you need to do in order to complete the overall task.
Something as simple as ‘switching on a light’ takes a few little tasks first. For example:
- Stand up (If beginning task from seated position)
- Walk over to light switch
- Press finger onto switch until light turns on
- Take finger off switch
I mean this is a super basic example, but you get the point. In order to complete projects, it take many, many little tasks that make up a complete task. That’s why powerful tasks and subtasks are important!
- Cross platform / user collaboration
Projects often involve other people. As well as having your personal to-do list within the Need To Do It software, you also have the ability to turn it into a task management/project management tool and include third parties. When working on specific tasks or projects, you’ll create a project list and work with colleagues. You’re also able to invite external users through either read-only access to full access. Really handy if you work transparently with clients and like them to be involved.
- News feed
This is a great feature. It’s just like your Facebook feed. When running many to-do’s / tasks / projects, having this news feed overview of updates and changes is very useful! This is great for an owner or manager especially that want to keep tabs on everything that is happening, but not necessarily get involved directly with projects. You can choose to follow specific projects and they appear on your feed.
- Voice control
A busy lifestyle often means you’re unable to write down to-do’s as and when needed. With voice control, you’re able to speak into the software to make notes, to-do’s and so on. It’s really helpful for those situations where you need to quickly get something written down.
- Workflow visualization
To maximize productivity and efficiency, the way tasks are laid out is super important. The correct workflow visualization is key to completing tasks properly vs at all. The Need To Do It software utilizes kanban board layouts to ensure that seeing your workflow is simple.
Disclaimer, I am reposting an edited answer from a very similar question.
You know that more often than not being creative means being far cry from technology. That’s why adopting a project management software might be a real bitter pill for creative teams. After all, the creative juices are fiercely flowing and instead of unleashing them, you have to sit down and learn the new software. I have been using Easy Projects software for already a year. I find it completely tailor-made for the creative needs of my team in the following aspects:
1.First of all, a project management software for creative teams should be easy to use and of course, full of visuals so that to minimize time spent on technical issues and not to hinder creativity.
2. The second crucial thing, in my opinion is to adopt a PM software that supports an easy adding and editing tool as changes, modifications and even whole revolutions happen so frequently in creative teams.
3. Finally, a PM software for creative teams should have killer flexible time tracking tool that can support single entry, weekly submissions or a built-in timer with a stopwatch functionality as you never know which one of the creative ideas is active at the moment.
If you want to find the best project and task management tool, check out IC Project. It is an easy-to-use program that works comprehensively and effectively. It combines many management tools. Among the competition, it is distinguished by its intuitive operation and lightness. It can be used by freelancers or companies employing several employees, as well as those that manage a much larger number of people. In the program you can organize projects, tasks, deadlines, mail, clients, employees... IC Project has much more features than you can imagine
professional project management tool (calendars, communicator, miniCRM)
You can add tasks to each project you create and assign tasks to people who are involved in them. As part of individual projects, add conversations and comments in which you can attach files. You can create instructions and articles available to everyone on the team.
You can manage the absences of your employees, track their progress at work and measure the time required to perform specific tasks. Create Gantt charts to analyze reports. And put individual tasks on the Kanban cards to know which tasks are in progress and which ones are not yet.
Functionalities:
✔️Project
Management
✔️Tasks
✔️Calendar
✔️Monitoring and
control
✔️Resource
management
✔️Kanbancards
✔️Dashboard
✔️Streamand
notifications
✔️Absences
✔️Messenger
✔️CRM
If you have up to 3
employees, you can use IC Project quite free. Moreover, regardless of
the size of the company, you can try for free for a month. Check ICP and
see if it's the solution for you.
So, I recommend IC Project because it
will allow you to surmount the chaos in a company. Organises and shares
tasks, reminding you in several ways about their deadlines. In addition,
the ability to work with a client on the same project at the same time
gives you immeasurable value for you and your clients.
Every tool have their own feature set and it totally depends up on your requirement how it fits your work life. Here I’d like to suggest ProofHub can be the best friend to plan, collaborate and organize all your dataOne thing that makes ProofHub stand out from the crowd is how it has a feature for every project management challenge. Our work management software works as a central place to manage and run projects, post updates, share ideas and collaborate with teams and clients.
- Discussions for long email threads
Oftentimes, meetings and long email chains consume most of our time. Discussions in our work management system put an end to the constant email volleyballing between you and the clients. It gets your teams, clients and stakeholders to collaborate on common topics effortlessly at one centralized place. Also, you can easily add someone in the discussion whenever required and brainstorm together.
With ProofHub, you also get the option to mark important discussions as private and archive them for future reference.
2. Tasks to keep things on track
ProofHub Tasks keeps your team running in the right direction by giving them a lucid view of their responsibilities. Bring clarity to work allocation by creating task lists with just one click, adding tasks, assigning them to team members and let them focus on getting things done.
You can also use labels to highlight tasks that require immediate attention and set start and end dates to define task deadlines. The best thing is that you can create recurring tasks so that they automatically get recreated after a designated period of time.
3. Kanban boards and Workflows to streamline the process
Kanban Boards and Workflows in ProofHub lets you divide the project tasks into stages and assign a workflow to provide a basic structure to team members. You even get the option to customize workflows as per your requirement.
It gives the teams a clear path of how the tasks need to progress and notifies people when tasks reach their stage. It is helpful for managers to keep an eye on who’s working on what and manage resources in a better way.
4. Keep files organized in Files section
We realized that it is the need of the hour to have a centralized place where project members can store, organize important stuff and collaborate. With our file sharing system, you will no longer have to worry about scattered files and documents all over the place. Simply upload them in ProofHub, share them with people, and easily access them.
With each file you upload in ProofHub, you get a sharing link that you can send to collaborators or even with people who don’t have a ProofHub account so that they can easily access those files as well.
5. Bring clarity to feedback process with built-in proofing
Our built-in Proofing tool speeds up the file and document review process and brings clarity to feedback sharing. Upload files, add collaborators and send an invitation to the clients. With the help of markup tools, clients and stakeholders can easily proof, mark changes and quickly provide their feedback.
Once the changes are made, you can approve files with a click of a button that saves everyone a lot of time and effort.
6. Real-time communication with Group chat
ProofHub unifies all your communications in one place, thus eliminating the need to have a separate tool to collaborate with teams, clients and stakeholders. It acts as a great way to end the usual communication barriers amongst team members.
You can initiate one-to-one or group chat without wasting time to visit each other’s desk. Apart from this, you also get the option to upload files from your computer and add emojis to make it fun and expressive.
7. Gantt charts for project roadmaps
You don’t have to employ a separate Gantt chart software to track the overall progress of projects anymore. ProofHub Gantt charts let you plan, manage, and track projects by bringing together everything you need to plan ahead and meet project deadlines.
You just have to create tasks, assign them, set dependencies and ProofHub will take care of everything else. If a task gets delayed or is moved ahead, the dependent tasks move and adjust accordingly keeping the project agile.
8. Custom roles for different access levels
It’s always a matter of concern that who’s gets to access what when multiple people are working on different aspects of a project. But don’t you worry, now you can assign roles, define access levels for individual team members to limit their activity, and stay in ultimate control.
9. Timesheets to get by-minute details
If you’re constantly worried about how to keep a track of the billable hours, then we make it easy by giving you the per-minute details of the time spent on each task and projects. Thus, making it easy to bill your clients and getting paid on time.
In ProofHub, you also get the option to record time manually or use the timer for accurate time tracking to avoid human errors.
10. Clear insights with ProofHub Reports
As a project manager, it’s important to know the project progress, track missing deadlines, overdue tasks, and milestones. ProofHub Reports give you a clear picture of how the resources are being utilized, how the projects are progressing so that you can get rid of the inefficiencies in the projects.
It takes out the pain to analyze projects and team performance and presents all the critical information in a beautiful format. Isn’t it an effective way to keep a bird’s eye view on the projects?
11. A tool that matches your brand identity
Establish your brand value by making your ProofHub account look just the way you want by personalizing its appearance. With its white-labeling feature, you get the flexibility to personalize your account to appear it in a color and theme of your choice and do a lot more with it.
Project management software is on the rise. From communication to project management, technology offers an abundance of options. More online collaboration tools spring up every year, while existing ones are constantly improving their features and functionality. Some companies grow and thrive through holacracy, a collaborative management structure. Here’s a list of the best collaboration tools that can support your team’s needs:
Communicate with your teamPeople can’t collaborate if they don’t communicate. From instant messaging to video conferencing tools , there are many options for team collaboration tools:
BRIEF
Brief is a team collaboration tool enabling team members to prioritize and focus on important tasks while minimizing distractions. Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.
The main purpose behind BRIEF
Modern life is filled with battles against information overload and constant connectivity. With so much effort spent filtering, absorbing, and prioritizing competing information streams, teamwork often suffers. To be effective, team leaders need the bird’s-eye view to efficiently manage workflows involving internal and external projects across multiple communication apps (text vs audio vs video), task trackers, synced calendars, and so much more. Brief was built to simplify and streamline the tools, processes, and time spent on planning and execution.
How does Brief work?
- Brief consolidates the most effective features you love about most highly rated messengers and task trackers.
- Group and private chats, file sharing of any size, desktop and browser accessibility, superior speed, and guaranteed safety.
- Improved task management: Turn any message into a task with one click. Don’t waste time copy-pasting. Set a task instantly and share it with your team.
- Helicopter view: Create “hubs” centralize, sort, and prioritize tasks depending on your needs and goals. This helps teams focus on critical tasks first and allows stakeholders to minimize time spent assessing progress.
- Ultimate ease: Eliminate the learning curve required by most project management tools. Brief features intuitive design that makes using it just about as simple as your basic messenger.
Brief helps you to:
- Seamlessly manage your team progress and spend more time on higher impact tasks.
- Organize daily tasks to remove unnecessary complexity and ambiguity while establishing clear processes.
- Highlight task priority and minimize miscommunications.
- Enable your team’s performance with better and faster communication, clearer process, and well-defined goals.
Flowdock
Flowdock is a group and private chat platform. Its most interesting feature is its team inbox which aggregates notifications from other channels, like Twitter, Asana and customer support tools.
Hope my answer helped you.
Have you discovered Aha! — the world’s #1 roadmap and marketing planning software?
After our last two companies were acquired by Aruba Networks and Citrix respectively, we wanted to help product and marketing managers roadmap and launch products customers love.
We were tired of using spreadsheets and wikis and trying to apply generic project management tools that were not designed for product management and marketing planning.
We also saw too many folks beaten down by soft strategies, weak communications, and lousy tools. So, we built Aha! and seem to have touched a nerve and now serve over 5,000 customers and 250,000 users.
We also just announced a new Startup Pack for other software startups, so it's affordable for all companies to create brilliant roadmaps and better manage features and requirements.
Check out a few screenshots of what Aha! can do for you.
Feature planning
Release planning
Strategic planning
Being a successful creative takes time and skill, and so the last thing you want to be bogged down with is managing admin. But communicating effectively with clients and other team members is a vital part of the creative process, and one that should be managed effectively if you want to avoid potential issues.
Whether you're working on a small or large scale project, instituting a team management software will help you become successful. Using a project management tool will help better communicate with your team and keep your clients informed. Having all your tasks laid out and assigned to the correct person will allow you to stay organised and ensure tasks are completed on time.
With a huge variety of project management applications available, here we turn a spotlight on the best ones currently on the market. In need of something a bit more creative? We've got all the best free graphic design software too.
Having a small creative team is probably the best thing that can happen to a project manager; not only in marketing or advertising sectors. These people are engaged in their work and have heads full of ideas. They bring freshness and innovation to the business contributing to its success.
Managing a small creative team, even though challenging, is exciting and much more enjoyable than working with a regular team. But when you work with a regular team, your and your subordinate’s work may become boring. Repeating tasks, monotonous activities, projects not allowing self-development and career progress – it’s easy to lose the spirit and engagement.
If your team is bored as much as you are, you can easily transform it into a small creative team by adding a little bit of positive energy in various forms. You can introduce diversity into the daily schedule, shift tasks between people, implement new management and work techniques, strategies or methodologies, and engage them into your role of the leader.
Creative team means a friendly and good atmosphere, diversity, and fast problem-solving. It also means that you can become a creative project manager. It’s nothing else but having a dream team!
On the one hand, managing a team of highly creative individuals is very enjoyable and pro-developmental for both sides. On the other hand, controlling a group of people who very often are the driving force of the company’s success requires almost perfect organization. Especially if you work with people of different mindsets, personalities with visionary ideas.
And there are two crucial aspects which you should pay attention to when it comes to keeping your small creative team organized. Without them, your team will plunge into chaos.
Exchanging information is extremely crucial in the business world. Particularly between teams and individual members. Proper information exchange enhances communication and collaboration. These are essential for smooth workflow and team management. If your team doesn’t collaborate on ideas and doesn’t provide full information on project stages or all other important data, it’s easy to get lost and fall out of track.
One of the best tools ever created to enhance information exchange is chat. But you have to be careful when you’re choosing a chat software because not all of them are suitable. The market offers a wide choice of chat but we recommend HeySpace. Why? Because it’s an innovative task management software with extensive features of chat.
Thanks to such a tool you can not only easily chat and connect with your team but also manage and track their tasks. Everything in just one place, no more switching between different apps and tabs!
Brief’s powerful productivity app gives users simple tools that bring personal and team focus. By combining chat, task dashboards, team hubs, file sharing and storage, teams have a simple menu of productivity tools that help execute around priorities, to make every action count.
Diversity, geographic distribution, time zones, cultural differences and varied reporting lines mean that teams are needing to embrace new ways of collaborating in order to drive productivity in today’s era of work. The connected, mobile and social workforce is all about real-time sharing of work, ideas and opinions. Brief’s entrepreneurial collaboration dashboard combines video, organization and communications tools into an elegant user dashboard that allows you to easily connect to anyone in the world, in real time either face-to-face or through chat/team hubs. When used effectively, Brief can eradicate the need to use email, making communication quicker and more focused. Research shows that 73 percent of all emails received by employees are no even relevant to their roles. More focused personal decision making and execution means a more focused you, and a more focused team that achieves more together.
During our team work we used BRIEF for our team collaboration and found a great service from here. Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.
Hope you will have a great team experience from there.
Best for Small Marketing Teams with Proofing Requirement – ProofHub
ProofHub would be your best bet if you are looking to facilitate project management and team collaboration for marketing and creative teams for small businesses. It includes everything that is needed to run your marketing projects efficiently keeping track of every detail giving you real-time visibility into everything your team is working on. ProofHub is a straightforward software that does not complicate project management any more than necessary and includes only the essential features like task management, time tracking, online proofing and approval, kanban boards, discussions and group chats, and reporting.
ProofHub is used by leading organizations like Netflix, TripAdvisor, Nike and many more. The software is available in two variants: Essential and Ultimate Control. Both of these options are charged a flat fee for an unlimited number of users, rather than charging per user.
Best for Teams looking for a Collaborative Tool – Trello
Trello is a great tool for people who aren’t familiar with Gantt charts or project management vocabulary. It is a light-weight tool that uses highly visual kanban-style boards for project management and team collaboration. While the tool is great for teams and projects that require simple to-do lists and basic task management, Trello lacks project management basics as Gantt charts, time-tracking components, resource management, and reporting tools. Trello’s design philosophy is centered around collaboration and visual work management and is not ideal for businesses that need more than a visual organization of work and checklists.
Trello has been widely used by companies like Google, Red Hat and Adobe where small groups need a collaborative platform to manage their daily activities.
Trello has two plans: Business Class and Enterprise that allows unlimited integration (called Trello Power-Ups) with tools like Evernote, MailChimp, Jira and more, along with basic security and file encryption policies. Trello also offers a true free forever version.
Best for Teams looking for Priority-based Scheduling – LiquidPlanner
LiquidPlanner is one of the most impressive and complex work-management systems in the market. Unlike every other project management tool, it allows employees to enter their best- and worst-case scenario times for tasks and their advanced priority-based scheduling engine rolls up these estimates to automatically predict reliable finish dates. The tool is best preferred for project environments marked by high levels of uncertainty in project schedules and shifting priorities. The tool also has other features like built-in time tracking and collaboration.
Popular brands such as Bayer, Cisco, and Daimler have been using LiquidPlanner for many years. LiquidPlanner offers two account levels: Professional and Enterprise. Both of these account levels require a minimum of five users and all pricing is based on annual contracts. LiquidPlanner costs more than many other project management apps.
Best for Teams looking for a Tool from CRM to Invoicing – Scoro
If your organization needs an all-in-one solution for managing customers, tracking sales to invoicing automation, then Scoro should be on your shortlist. It has a tidy set of features suitable for small to medium-sized teams and enables the users to unify data across their CRM, billing and work management tools, thus eliminating the need for separate tools. Scoro is an end-to-end business management solution that allows client-based businesses like agencies to eliminate routine project management tasks and streamline the entire workflow from one place.
Brands like Air Guru, Grant Thornton, and WSI trust Scoro to run their businesses smoothly and efficiently. Scoro comes in three plans: Plus, Premium and Ultimate. All plans require a minimum 5 user sign-up.
Best for Enterprises looking for Custom Services and Integrations – Clarizen
Clarizen is a professional services automation software that’s best suited for larger organizations and enterprises. It is quite pricey and not ideal for small businesses. With Clarizen, the workflow and business rules automation is pretty flexible and powerful, and it also offers reasonably good cross-project visibility, reporting, resource, and financial management capabilities. Out of the box, Clarizen has some very powerful integration capabilities with other tools like Jira, Salesforce, and Intaact, to name a few. One can also browse their apps marketplace to add more functionality and custom integrations. For large enterprises, Clarizen also offers custom services that include interactive training sessions and a dedicated implementation consultant to provide process guidance and help streamline adoption.
Customers such as Box, Western Union, Cisco, and Sodexo use Clarizen to increase their project performance and efficiencies. While Clarizen frequently keeps changing their pricing and plans, currently they offer two tiers of service: Enterprise and Unlimited. They also offer different types of user licenses based on the level of access required. Their plans and pricing are typically based on a 36-month contract, paid in advance.
However, figuring out how to use a specific tool is more important than choosing one, IMHO. It took us a couple of months to figure out how to use the tool.
We use Trello as follows for our small creative team:
- Each swim lane is a person.
- Each card is an action item
- Minimal use of checklists
- Labels denote state
- We pull up the Trello app at our daily standup to see everyone's progress, how it relates to our sprint goals, and to keep each other motivated.
- When we can, we upload images (which makes the board fun less bland to look at, and helps us establish a sense of progress)
For a successful project irrespective of the size, the 4 key factors that play crucial role are:
- an excellent Plan
- hassle free Collaboration with teams and clients
- Organizing data, files, team members.
- and Delivering it on time within budget.
Some screenshots:
Overview:
Discussions:
Gantt charts:
Reports:
As some of the previous answers prove, there really isn’t a “best” task/project management software for a certain industry or group of professionals. The solution you go for will depend mostly on your team’s needs, the mandatory features and the amount you’re willing to spend.
Pipefy is a great alternative to regular task/project management tools - as a process management platform, instead of only managing projects/tasks, with Pipefy you’re able to create standards of execution for recurring activities, easily adapting to your team’s needs.
It's an intuitive, simple to use, workflow software that helps businesses of all types and sizes manage their processes in a single platform, ensuring efficiency and solid execution.
Instead of limiting its capabilities to task and project management, Pipefy offers you with the possibility of creating tailor-made workflows to suit your company needs, without the need for technical skills.
Pipefy works as an online Kanban system in which tasks, represented by cards, move laterally through the multiple phases of your process. It offers a wide range of pre-designed process templates to help you model your company’s processes.
This is what an open card looks like:
You’re able to edit each of your process’ phases to better suit your needs with its own set of work rules and triggers. You can also set up each task’s due date, add attachments, assignees and much more.
Pipefy offers tools that allow you to integrate and automate your processes - Email Templates and Pipe Connections - among many others to help you manage your workflows!
Stay Tuned with your Team For Better Collaboration:
Have you ever tried the intelligent and suggestive project management tool - PineStem.
Either it is an MNC or a small team of creative agents, this project management tool would be very handy and help in completing the tasks and projects with ease.
PineStem thinks for you and depending upon the past performance analytics will suggest you with the best resource available. A project management tool like never before.
It is also available as an mobile which makes the project manager handle the projects and tasks from any remote place with just one. PineStem - Android Apps on Google Play
Look at the software here pinestem or you never know what you are missing.
Benefits:
No initial cost
No termination fees
First 2 projects with upto 10 users are Free
Pay only for active users
Buy licenses to get unlimited projects
All features included.
Pricing starts from as low as USD 9.99/User/Month on an annual billing.
For more please visit https://pinestem.com
Different companies have different requirements. They may vary in size, structure, and budget. There are a lot of free tools available in the market. But its always better to invest in a tool like project management software because it is going to be really helpful in the long run. Project management software can help you to task management, communication management, team management, report management and what not. You can check out these project management software for your small creative team.
Personally, I've used these ones:
It has a dozen unique report templates with real-time, actionable insights into how their team is performing.
2. Asana
This one is by far the easiest tool I’ve used. With this project management software, each person knows what they should be doing and why. This gives transparency and clarity to every member of the team.
3. Meshink
It helps to keep a tab on their team members, track their time, allocate resources to projects and manage cost. It helps you in maintaining your team, irrespective of the fact they are operating from within the organization or outside.
Hope this helps :)
Hello there!
I have read many interesting answers there and I suppose that the most suitable technical tool for small teams is Trello. there you can see all the necessary things for your work. However, despite its popularity, Trello becomes to lose its former glory because of the lack of functions and limited tasks distribution boards.
When I started working in IT industry as QA engineer, I used only Jira (for the technical part of my work) and Trello (for the communication with other team members). But it was rather uncomfortable to combine two these softwares for actually one purpose - doing my work.
But recently, several months ago, I came to the project where all used the tool software called Hygger[1]. And I really can say it’s convenient for every spheres. See the screenshot of this program:
There I can observe all my current tasks and follow their checklists (if it is a kind of a complex task):
Also Hygger provides such a good function as a roadmap: it is a form of planning that allows you to set long-term or current goals for the project, as well as assign tasks for specific people. Yes, it's nice to have:
Generally speaking, I’d really recommend you to try Hygger and tell your personal opinion about it. I hope my advice will be helpful for you!
Footnotes
[1] Hygger - Powerful Project Management Software for Tech Companies
There are some great suggestions here. As a relatively small team that also has many small creative teams as customers, we have been using Trello for our day-to-day project management, along with our own product Resource Guru, which looks after our resource scheduling and future capacity planning.
Trello
Trello's board/list/card
system offers us a good mix of high and low-level project management. We
get visibility of each projects status via the position of the project's
card on our boards, which we have split by department (Marketing,
Development etc). We can then set tasks and checklists on these cards
for the work that needs to be completed, add attachments and labels, and
any additional comments for team-members as needed.
Resource
Guru
We use Resource
Guru (full disclosure: I work there) in addition to
Trello to schedule our team members.
The drag and drop bookings calendar gives us an overview of the upcoming projects that each team member is working on, along with their meetings, time off, and any remaining availability. We then use the filters on the calendar to find quick answers to questions like "Do we have a web developer free for a project next Wednesday?", which helps us with capacity planning and to make more informed project management decisions.
As with Trello, we've designed Resource Guru to be very easy to learn and use. The app is intuitive and most people can learn to use it without training, leading to huge savings in time and money compared to more bloated, complicated team scheduling offerings.
For a full list of features or to start a free trial check out: Resource Guru
- Multiple users can edit the same task description simultaneously and see all changes in real-time. Use the revision history tool to see every change made to your task, and if you ever need to revert to an earlier draft, just use the time slider to find the right version.
- Attach files directly to tasks from Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, or your computer — no need to email them back and forth. All your latest drafts, design mockups, and sketches are in one space, easily accessible to your whole team. The best part is, you can preview and edit attachments right from the workspace — no need to download them to your computer first.
- Comment right on a task to spitball new ideas, leave feedback, or ask for input. @Mention any of your colleagues in a comment to grab his or her attention with an immediate notification.
- Invite external collaborators (like freelancers, clients, etc.) to
contribute to tasks, while limiting their access to the rest of your
account.
For business or personal use, task and project management apps can really go a long way of helping you get organized. Using these handy tools increases your productivity and get the most out of your day without having to invest unnecessary time. Task and project management apps help you get a grip and keep a close eye on tasks that are urgent and of high priority to your team.
Here is my top three task management software for you:
1. Trello – is one of the most popular task project management software in the market. This app lets you organize your team’s tasks with its project boards. You can also color code those tasks and assign priority colors.
2, Asana – Trello’s sister software. This app allows you and your team create a project within a project. Really good for collaboration.
3. Microsoft Planner –
if you own an Office 365 you might want to take a look at this tool.
This app also allows for collaboration within your team and assign color
coding for task status, much like Trello. Microsoft Planner can also
double as a daily planner for personal use.
I hope I was able to
answer your question. You can read this informative article on how to
use Microsoft Planner as well as tips and tricks here.
Successfully managing clients and projects rely on having the right systems in place to keep track of where you're up to. Post-it notes stuck to your desk simply won't do. Not when the workload and pressures start to increase.
This is where an online project management tool will become especially handy. Something that you can access from both your desktop and mobile, no matter where you are or what you're doing.
There are loads of contenders on the market. Some are free. Others come with a small monthly subscription fee. The following 10 project management tools have been hand-picked by Creative Boom just for you.
Active Collab is a powerful, yet simple project management tool – perfect for your small business. It helps you and your team stay organised when you outgrow email, but it’s also much more than that — with plenty of helpful add-ons, it’s a one-stop solution for all your projects. You can delegate tasks to your team, get a detailed overview of all team activities, track time spent on individual tasks and issue invoices to clients in just a couple of seconds.
With a free 30 day trial, you will get access to all features and see how a smooth project workflow can add value to your small business from day one. Highly recommended.
Trello is the platform that gives you a shared perspective on any kind of project. It's completely free, so probably an excellent choice for those of you who have just gone freelance. It's also very visual – appealing to those of you who prefer to see all your tasks laid out on screen.
Basically, you can create boards that include lists and then you can drag and drop items between lists to show progress... so you might have 'to do', 'doing' and 'done' boards. Simple and effective, it's one of our favourites. And if you like what you see, you can upgrade to Business Class for just $8.33 per user/month (when paid annually) and get access to app integrations, team overviews and more security.
With tasks, projects, conversations and dashboards, Asana allows you to move work from start to finish. You can see progress for any project at a glance, without scheduling a status meeting or sending an email. You can turn conversations into actionable tasks, so you can take the next step. It might be a tad simplified for some, as it doesn't have as many features as other solutions out there. But it does the job if you just need simple task management.
Brought to you by the people at 37Signals, Basecamp is a classic, feature-rich tool to help you manage your tasks with to-do lists and streamline your communication through handy message boards. You can also set deadlines and milestones, send 'pings' to your team and direct messages, and organise all your key docs, files and assets. With all-inclusive pricing and no charge per user, you're never charged more if you hire someone new.
Brief’s powerful productivity app gives users simple tools that bring personal and team focus. By combining chat, task dashboards, team hubs, file sharing and storage, teams have a simple menu of productivity tools that help execute around priorities, to make every action count.
Diversity, geographic distribution, time zones, cultural differences and varied reporting lines mean that teams are needing to embrace new ways of collaborating in order to drive productivity in today’s era of work. The connected, mobile and social workforce is all about real-time sharing of work, ideas and opinions. Brief’s entrepreneurial collaboration dashboard combines video, organization and communications tools into an elegant user dashboard that allows you to easily connect to anyone in the world, in real time either face-to-face or through chat/team hubs. When used effectively, Brief can eradicate the need to use email, making communication quicker and more focused. Research shows that 73 percent of all emails received by employees are no even relevant to their roles. More focused personal decision making and execution means a more focused you, and a more focused team that achieves more together.
Hope you will have a great team experience from there.
Good Luck.
When a team at a creative agency is working on a project, they want to worry about the project itself, and not all of the little details that go into managing it. But, project management is an important aspect of any project, and it must be done. So, why not find the best tools that will help make this job a whole lot easier? To get you started, we have compiled a list of the top five project management tools for creative agencies.
1. Paymo
You don’t have to be a project manager to be able to easily take on project management when you are using Paymo. This project management software allows you to take total control over projects so you know everyone is working together and getting things done. You can use Paymo’s many features, which include task management, task assignments, project templates, project planning, progress visual Kanban boards, bird’s eye view of all projects, milestones, and detailed project data. This is going to make project management easier than ever, and you and your team will have a lot more time to concentrate on the tasks rather than managing them.
2. Wrike
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Use this tool to get real-time information about everything that your team is involved with. You can create reports that allow you to track the performance of your team, track projects and more, and you just have to click on one button to do it. Wrike is ideal for marketing teams, creative teams, project management teams and product development teams that want to take their work to the next level. Your team will have more control over their time, less stress, and be more connected to one another so everyone always knows what is going on in the project, and what needs to be done in order to make it successful.
3. Workamajig
Here is the best project management software for those working in the creative industry. It can be used both for agencies and for in-house teams, and it is used by some of the foremost creative teams in the world. Use this tool to collaborate on one platform, get accurate data, do away with negative input, improve staff and management visibility, create in-depth reports, and see better returns on investments. This is an all-in-one solution for creative teams that want to spend less time on project management details and more time on actually getting more projects successfully completed.
4. LiquidPlanner
This is a tool that allows you to create realistic project schedules for your team. Use LiquidPlanner to schedule multiple projects, track time, collaborate and communicate, schedule the appropriate amount of time for various tasks, and more. This tool is safe and easy to use, and can be used on all mobile devices. This is the tool that technology teams need to have in order to have the speed and accuracy they need. You can request a demo, or try it out now with a free trial. There is nothing to lose, so take a few minutes to see how you can make scheduling a lot easier.
5. Asana
No matter how big or small your organization is, you can benefit from using Asana. This tool lets you track projects from beginning to end, and it makes project tracking easier than ever. Asana is easy to use. If you are able to create an email list, you will have no problem using this tool. You can get started for free, so it really is worth checking out. Every member of your team will be able to get a clear and concise picture of what is going on at any given time throughout projects, so they know what has been done, and what still needs to be done.
Brief is a team collaboration tool enabling team members to prioritize and focus on important tasks while minimizing distractions. Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.
Modern life is filled with battles against information overload and constant connectivity. With so much effort spent filtering, absorbing, and prioritizing competing information streams, teamwork often suffers. To be effective, team leaders need the bird’s-eye view to efficiently manage workflows involving internal and external projects across multiple communication apps (text vs audio vs video), task trackers, synced calendars, and so much more. Brief was built to simplify and streamline the tools, processes, and time spent on planning and execution.
How does Brief work?
Brief consolidates the most effective features you love about most highly rated messengers and task trackers.
Group and private chats, file sharing of any size, desktop and browser accessibility, superior speed, and guaranteed safety.
Improved task management: Turn any message into a task with one click. Don’t waste time copy-pasting. Set a task instantly and share it with your team.
Helicopter view: Create “hubs” centralize, sort, and prioritize tasks depending on your needs and goals. This helps teams focus on critical tasks first and allows stakeholders to minimize time spent assessing progress.
Ultimate ease: Eliminate the learning curve required by most project management tools. Brief features intuitive design that makes using it just about as simple as your basic messenger.
Brief helps you to:
Seamlessly manage your team progress and spend more time on higher impact tasks.
Organize daily tasks to remove unnecessary complexity and ambiguity while establishing clear processes.
Highlight task priority and minimize miscommunications.
Enable your team’s performance with better and faster communication, clearer process, and well-defined goals.
With multiple, simultaneous conversations happening inside a single Slack channel, we began losing track of things. Ideas were proposed, discussed for a bit, and lost. As a result, the same questions and issues were often brought up multiple times.
However, After quieting slack we used some alternative tools for team communication and from there we found BRIEF. This is an alternative of slack and it has a combination of all top features for team communication.
Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.
Brief’s powerful productivity app gives users simple tools that bring personal and team focus. By combining chat, task dashboards, team hubs, file sharing and storage, teams have a simple menu of productivity tools that help execute around priorities, to make every action count.
Diversity, geographic distribution, time zones, cultural differences and varied reporting lines mean that teams are needing to embrace new ways of collaborating in order to drive productivity in today’s era of work. The connected, mobile and social workforce is all about real-time sharing of work, ideas and opinions. Brief’s entrepreneurial collaboration dashboard combines video, organization and communications tools into an elegant user dashboard that allows you to easily connect to anyone in the world, in real time either face-to-face or through chat/team hubs. When used effectively, Brief can eradicate the need to use email, making communication quicker and more focused. Research shows that 73 percent of all emails received by employees are no even relevant to their roles. More focused personal decision making and execution means a more focused you, and a more focused team that achieves more together.
During our team work we used BRIEF for our team collaboration and found a great service from here. Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.
Hope you will have a great team experience from there.
Good Luck.
I would have to say the best project management software for small creative teams is Priority Matrix.
There are multiple creative teams who use our platform to manage their projects.
The app is based on the Eisenhower Method of time management which promotes prioritizing tasks based on their level of Criticality, and how Urgently they must be finished.
This ensures that you and your team stay focused on what's most important, while keeping busy work off your desk.
Creative teams use our app to:
(choose SOME of the criteria below 5-10, pick the ones that best fit the situation described in the question - if they ask for something and you don’t know if we have that feature, ask me :) )
- Create various projects to logically categorize tasks
- Add notes and upload files to tasks
- Utilize our in-app chat to communicate with your team in
real-time
- Add due dates to tasks, and sync with your calendar
- Delegate tasks to team members at
the touch of a button
- Improve visibility and accountability across your team
- Use our Master List to view items across all projects
- Set task reminders to make sure nothing slips through the cracks
- Collaborate on projects, while keeping others private
- Check up on daily and weekly reports about your team
- Save hours per
week when you stop re-writing your to-do list
One of our customer success representatives would be happy to provide you with a personalized consultation on how to best integrate the product with your business.
We are available for Mac, Windows, Android, iPhone, and iPad.
Check out our website, or find more productivity tips on our blog.
If you like visual tools, I recommend checking out https://casual.pm
Casual helps you manage projects as awesome visual maps.
Planning a project is as simple as sketching it on a flip chart or piece of paper. It's a super intuitive way to manage your tasks and projects online.
Casual has been specially crafted for creatives and non-project managers who don’t feel comfortable with complicated Gantt charts and other pro management stuff.
If your team deals with similar and repeatable projects - Casual would be super useful for it’s amazing project templates.
Like most pm software on the market Casual gives you everything for great project tracking and team collaboration. Add deadlines and sync them with Google Calendar, post comments and write notes. Upload files from your computer, Dropbox, or Google Drive. Assign teammates and get notifications. Finally, export your projects to PDFs or images.
Casual provides FREE plans for Public Schools & Non-Profit Organizations.
If you are interested in trying out Casual there is a 14-day free trial available.
Check it out https://casual.pm/
There are lots of good project management software as you can see a big list in the other answer here. But since you asked for creative, here is the one I find creative enough to recommend.
Free Team Workspace Tool to Manage Projects, Tasks, Contacts Online
Instead of having a traditional (boring) dashboard for management, this tool has feeds like Facebook. It lists all the task and status there right at the homepage. Any team member can post a task or status to keep everyone in the loop. And, teammates can like and comment on each update along with an option to split task.
To fulfill the needs of a project management tool, it lets you create unlimited projects and manage them under multiple workspaces. It also has contact management where you can add contact info about clients and companies and refer them in respective projects. Although it has a paid-tier, the free plan is good for a team up to 5 members.
Being a creative is not for the faint of heart. Requests are many and resources too few. Tight deadlines and tighter budgets stretch your team paper-thin. Communication is haphazard, status updates go missing, and feedback loops never end.
Trello
Trello is the platform that gives you a shared perspective on any kind of project. It's completely free, so probably an excellent choice for those of you who have just gone freelance. It's also very visual – appealing to those of you who prefer to see all your tasks laid out on screen.
Brief
Brief is a team collaboration tool enabling team members to prioritize and focus on important tasks while minimizing distractions. Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.
Brief’s entrepreneurial collaboration dashboard combines video, organization and communications tools into an elegant user dashboard that allows you to easily connect to anyone in the world, in real time either face-to-face or through chat/team hubs. When used effectively, Brief can eradicate the need to use email, making communication quicker and more focused.
Slack
When managing remote teams, the key to successful management and work output is proper communication. Slack is an online based chat room that is accessible to all team members.
Asana
With tasks, projects, conversations and dashboards, Asana allows you to move work from start to finish. You can see progress for any project at a glance, without scheduling a status meeting or sending an email.
Basecamp
Brought to you by the people at 37Signals, Basecamp is a classic, feature-rich tool to help you manage your tasks with to-do lists and streamline your communication through handy message boards. You can also set deadlines and milestones, send 'pings' to your team and direct messages, and organise all your key docs, files and assets.
Apollo
Apollo allows you to prioritise tasks, organise projects and keep your team on the same page. With task lists, milestones, schedules and the ability to track time, you'll be on top of your project management in no time. There's even a CRM feature that allows you to keep tabs on contacts and leads, so it offers way more than the usual.
Project Bubble
Manage more projects in less time – that's the claim from Project Bubble, an online tool that offers easy project management. shared calendar, team collaboration, time tracking, powerful reporting and a promise of safety and security.
Freedcamp
Manage every aspect of life. That's the promise from Freecamp, which gives you a dashboard with quick access to every project – one place to stay organised, updated and productive.
Canva for Work
Canva for Work is a tool that allows its users to access and collaborate on graphics work. It is a tool that is very easy to use and compatible with different devices. Canva for Work makes it possible for anyone in the team to design documents with its drag and drop feature.
The Time Doctor
Last but not the least, The Time Doctor is essential for anyone running a remote team. It’s a remote time tracker which was created for the sole purpose of tracking the productivity of remote employees.
Hope it was helpful.
Shameless plug :) At Twoodo we've created a team collaboration tool for the #hashtag generation. Getting organized is as simple as #hashtagsand @mentions. Here's an example:
It's as simple as Twitter. All your communication is organized by +teams and #topics.
You can insert #todos, #votes, #questions directly in your conversations.
If you are looking for a lightweight and dynamic solution for your small team, I would recommend Nuclino! It’s a simple and fast collaboration tool with a great user experience and beautiful design. We use it for research, brainstorming, meeting minutes, task management, and more. Some features that I really like:
- Rich editor with file attachments, checkboxes, video embeds, code blocks, and more
- Users can edit the same page at the same time
- Easy linking between pages (simply type “@” to link to another page)
- Mentions and notifications so that all team members stay up to date
- The content is automatically visualized in a mindmap
- It’s offered as a SaaS and has a free package
This is what it looks like:
It’s difficult to claim that one project management software will be the best for small creative teams, it really depends on your needs (features, budget, integrations, devices supported, etc).
However, you can have a look at the top 25 Project Management software published by GetApp. Each application is scored using five different factors: user reviews, integrations, mobile app availability, media presence, and security. Asana, Dapulse, and Trello are ranked #2, #4 and #5 in the Project Management Category Leaders ranking and are used by small teams.
Asana is a cloud-based project and task management solution. The software is intuitive and facilitates team collaboration and communication. It helps teams to share, plan, organize, and track progress of the tasks that each member is working on. It allows you to create projects, and then tasks within these projects. You can add your teammates, leave comments, give feedbacks, upload attachments and set due dates on the tasks or projects. The application also lets you track the progress of tasks for each team member from any device (desktop, tablet or smartphone). Asana’s users rated the software 4.35 out of 5 on GetApp.
Dapulse is a project management and collaboration software, with a dashboard that makes it easy to see in a single glance exactly where things stand. You can add tasks, projects, missions, to-dos, assign teammates to specific tasks or projects and plan your workload over time. It also allows you to communicate with your team, mention people, comment on your teammates’ work, upload files and get notified via desktop or mobile. You can visualize on the platform everything your team is working on, instantly evaluate your team's bandwidth, see who's busy and who's not and ensure you'll meet all of your deadlines. Rated 4.79 out of 5 on GetApp, Dapulse’s users describe it as a simple and easy-of-use platform.
Trello is a project management software designed for small and mid-sizes businesses. It permits to organize your projects and your day to day work. The application helps you to collaborate in real time with your colleagues, but also to manage your projects more efficiently. It gives you a better visibility into what your team is working on and helps you track components and deadlines in all your projects. The software is very easy to use and to set up. Trello has also a mobile application that enables you to work on your projects on the go. Trello is free to use. However there is a Trello Gold plan at $5 per month. Rated 4.4 /5, you can check here what users say about the application.
To get an overview over all tools and see which one fits to your needs, you can use the GetApp comparison tool. I also recommend you to check other softwares’ profile pages from the ranking. It will help you to know more about what other project management applications have to offer (features, pricing, reviews,integrations).
Another option would be to select the options that describes your business and specific needs (organization type, features, pricing, required integrations, supported devices, etc.) to see which Project Management software can be a good fit for your business.
Disclosure: I work at GetApp
For the successful and on-time delivery of projects in a proficient and quick response, project management in a highly advanced approach is necessary. More smarty the organization manages its projects, better they will be able to produce the results. As a result, able to achieve client’s satisfaction which automatically results in business growth. For an industry that is employing hundreds of projects under process, it is a complex that to proficiently manage the projects. To solve this headache, we are here to facilitate you all with the “Quick Start Admin” which is an online project management software. By using this online project tracking software, the users will be able to track the actual status of the project and they will be able to instantly taking suitable steps for the on-time completion of each individual project.
The best project management software for small creative teams? GamePlan. Why? It is the only software with a visual user interface to a real scheduling engine.
The visual Whiteboard user interface makes it simple to use. Everything is drag and drop. The visual aspect makes it fun to use because you get to be creative while you work, and this makes people want to plan their projects. This leads to better planning, and better planning leads to better project execution.
Our users say that GamePlan makes them feel “calm” and “in control”. They say it gives them “peace of mind” because they know exactly what they will get done and when. It also gives them a bird’s eye view of upcoming projects so they know what lies ahead.
The key to this feeling of being in control is the scheduling engine. Task management tools are great at keeping everyone on task, but because they don’t contain scheduling, they can’t tell you what is really achievable. Most humans are optimistic by nature, and our optimism often leads to over-optimistic expectations, which puts pressure on teams that limits their creativity in order to meet deadlines. Only project scheduling tools solve this. But, beware, just because a tool contains a Gantt chart does not mean that it produces a practical project schedule. The schedule must be resource-leveled in order to be achievable. Otherwise people will be over-allocated, which will also result in high pressure, and having to work overtime, in order to meet the schedule.
The solution is an easy to use, resource-leveled project scheduler. GamePlan has all of this and more, and you can try it for free at www.gameplan.global.
When approaching this question we should consider the importance of assigning different tasks and roles to your team members and being able to measure how the project is going. With Flokzu you can do exactly that and more.
Being a tool in the cloud, Flokzu assures you that every change and decision made in the project will be secured and easy to access.
Some key aspects of this tool include being able to assign tasks according to previous decisions and doing tasks in parallel (at the same time) while following a certain workflow pre-designed by the team. Furthermore, you are able to interconnect your team work with the daily apps you regularly use. Via Zapier you can integrate Flokzu with more than 700 apps so that you can easily import or export data.
Another distinctive functionality of this tool is the possibility of assigning different roles to the team members so that every participant is in charge of a certain area (will receive tasks according to it).
Even inviting new members is very easy, you send them an invitation to their email and once they accept it, they are in!.
As simple as this:
What about measuring my team work?
Flokzu dashboard of metrics will tell you exactly what tasks have been done, which ones have not, and who is in charge of them. That being said, you will be able to determine the bottlenecks in your project and work in that area.
These aspects make Flokzu a really good tool for team work projects and the best part is that our free plan has no time limit. You should give it a try.
That`s why you need a lot of different tools to stay in touch with your co-workers and clients, and even more tools to follow budget and schedule.
Nevertheless, at the end of the day, it`s all about creativity and collaboration. I would like to recommend you to check out our project management tool, which is called Worksection (worksection.com).
You can track anything within a couple of clicks. And it`s really easy to use, so you don`t need much time to figure out how to work with it.
As for collaboration, I have to say that we have great commenting system, which you can use to create ideas and discuss them with your colleagues.
Besides, it`s really easy to track your colleagues work: how much time they spent on each tusk, what amount of work was done etc.
So, try Worksection! I hope, you will like it!
I would check out this Project Management Software & Sales Gamification Games platform. WorkEngaged focuses on motivational techniques. Their pricing page has a calculator that shows you exactly how much engaged employees make a difference to the company. They also are the only company to offer engagement games and integrated recognition software. You can install 3rd party plugins that can help customize the experience for your team. You can also try it out for FREE.
Small creative teams have different needs than normal project teams in a large company. You need to be able to collaborate on tasks and add images to a central place.
Zenkit is a project management platform that is perfect for small teams. A flexible software that can be used to view your data any way you want. As a creative, you probably work differently that your team members and we love that.
In Zenkit you can switch the “view” of you data between Kanban, list, calendar, table and even a mind map. This allows each team member to use the best tool for the task at hand, without forcing every other team member to work the same way. Each view works on the same core data in the project.
Be as creative as you want with your workflow.
More in Łukasz Nowak's answer to What is the best online project management software for a startup that’s in the cloud (stories, tasks within stories, people, optional SVN integration programming and non-programming tasks)? What is the feedback on Agilezen, redmine, and other tools?
Goodies
Read more about Agile as a symbol of modern project management development | PMBoss.org
Arc 9 is great for small teams giving then the ability to be agile and enables remote collaboration. With Arc 9 you can manage projects, teams and clients, review/approve and present all media. With our new integrations you can chat and live screen share. Arc9 has custom branding so you can create your own branded media space and it is designed to be creative friendly
I’ll say ProofHub to be the best suites for small creative teams.
ProofHub’s work management system brings your projects, remote teams and clients under one roof, empowering you to keep things always under your ultimate control.
ProofHub puts all the pieces of your project’s puzzle in their right place
Our work management software works as a central place to manage and run your projects and teams withTasks to keep things on track, Discussion topics to post updates, share ideas and collaborate with teams and clients, Files and documents to keep the entire information organized, Group chat to ask questions, get answers and continue important conversations seamlessly, Proof and review files and documents quickly, and Track time spent on the projects.
With ProofHub’s work management tool you also gain the ultimate control with Gantt charts to create the project plans that’ll ensure timely completion of the projects, assign Project manager to keep a bird’s eye view on project progress, create Custom roles to define access levels for the teams and clients, and Project reports for insights on how the projects are progressing, and how teams and individuals are performing.
ZilicusPM - project management software , Zilicus is the global leader in enterprise project management software.ZilicusPM to help organizations to effectively manage projects and improve team-client collaboration.
ZilicusPM, the cost effective solution, updates you about project planning & tracking through email notification, alerts ensuring collaboration & transparency.
Online Project Management Software, Project Management Tool
It's a great tool for collaborative and communicative teams. This allows you delegate tasks to your team and see what they are doing on real-time.
HiveFlux is helpful for Creative Agencies, where time management and team collaboration is important, and who typically need robust time-tracking solutions. It helps any sized company better manage their work, particularly when their teams are dispersed.
For creative teams, you can work on your tasks and collaborate visually using KnightSpear. It’s a task management system that lets you share screenshots, illustrations and images with annotations and arrows to provide specific instructions on what modifications should be made. Copies or other documents are also arranged into versions to eliminate confusion when you need to download the most recent file version.
KnightSpear also has internal chat, @mention and ‘Nudge’ feature to make sure the team constantly communicates to discuss tasks, brainstorm for ideas and get team member’s attention on a particular task.
Honestly, look no further: Vavingo is all you need to manage your tasks, message everyone with confidence, and run a smooth operation.
Not to mention its crips-clear UI design so everyone in your team loves it each and every day.
There are few tech-secrets that we’ve build in the back (which we can’t share here, obviously) so you’re always 100% sure things are getting done by your team.
Register on Vavingo to know see I’m talking about.
For highly straight review and approval process try Approval Studio
- Easy for team usage
- Enterprise features in affordable packages
- Cool log and proof report
- Beautiful comparison models
Approval Studio - SAAS created for people working will all sorts of designs and artworks to help with coordination and communication issues that are typical for such process. Enterprise features in affordable plans
We launched beta and looking for creative directors, managers at design studios and agencies to get market feedback.
What problem do we solve?
It’s one thing if you sit with your team in one room during the creation of your artwork and have a chance to coordinate all the actions right away. It’s totally another thing when you need to get the feedback from the client over the phone or email and deliver it to designer without missing a word.
Though even sitting in one room you may misinterpret some words and spend extra time to create something wrong.
Approval Studio is designed to avoid such misunderstanding.
Target audience
As it was mentioned above, Approval Studio fits perfectly to any company or department that works with all types of artwork, images, etc. for example:
- Design Studio
- Creative Agency
- Branding Agency
- Packaging and design studios
- Goods producers having in-house design departments
Potential Users
- Approval Studio is not a “single player” app, but designed for teams or service provider\customer tandems.
- Agency owners can increase the overall team profitability.
- Project managers – decrease project fulfillment time.
- Designers\Copywriters – to spend less time searching for emails or messages with comments or change requests and devote more time to actual creative process.
What you can do in Approval Studio.
Major item in the system is Project, that allows to collect all the artwork related information in one place – reference documents, sketches, file versions, information about the client and project, etc.
The web-app is very flexible however, and you don’t need to enter any information if you don’t want to.
Enter the project name and leave all other fields empty if that is your choice, but remember, that all the fields can be used as search criteria later, so giving a bit more info may be useful.
Approval Studio allows to invite anyone to join the artwork review, even if this person does not have the Approval Studio account your visitor will be able to leave annotation, change request, approve or reject current version. In other words, your client can join you and give the specific instruction, point the exact place where the changes should be applied and even have a chat like discussion with everyone who has access to the file.
You know the situation when the customer claims that the project took longer than expected – with Approval Studio you can see how fast did you get the response from the client, how many change requests were made and how fast did you react. Having all that information on hands, you can always protect yourself from any accusation from customer side and see how you can speed the project up.
In case you have several versions of that artwork – you can use 4 different comparison types to see the exact changes from version to version and choose the best one.
The system is working live, so you will see all the changes done to the project right away even if your colleague is on the different side of the globe.
At any moment you can generate a Proof Report with all the annotations, comments, approvals or rejections of every file version.
You can also see the detailed project log with the every taken step.
Final version of the artwork can be sent to the printing house or to the client directly from Approval Studio (and you will have a record about that in the web app), even huge PSD or CDR files can be easily sent.
What is next?
Current beta test aimed to understand the product/market fit better. It means we going to realise what features liked be any persona. We are also building integration wishlist. For now it’s project popular management tools with no/poor review and approval flow.
Disclaimer - I work here.
Hive is an awesome solution for small creative teams.
Why?
- Flexible project views - See your projects in 5 unique ways:
- Kanban boards
- Gantt Charts
- By Assignee
- By Label
- and Calendar
- Robust project organization - You can create, manage, edit and archive your projects all at once in Hive’s project navigator. It’s easy to control what projects you see by hiding the ones you don’t.
- Project templates - If you often have the same steps each project, you can create a template that you can copy again and again. It saves a ton of time setting up projects.
- Integrated chat - It brings your conversations out of email and puts them in the context of your projects.
- Request forms - Hive allows your team to create custom forms, send them to anyone, and receive the requests automatically.
- FREE GUEST USER ACCESS - Invite as many temporary collaborators and clients as you would like for free
That’s just the tip of the iceberg.
If you’d like to learn more about Hive can help your team, sign up here for your free trial!
Even if you’re a smaller creative team now, I think it’s important to choose a project management tool that can grow with you. Messy processes and poor collaboration only get harder as your team gets bigger!
There are some specific project management features that help put your creative team in a great position to grow. These include:
- Efficient file management
- Customizable workflow statuses
- Project templates
- Collaborative editing
- Native mobile apps
- Easy, real-time reporting
- Visual project timelines
- Adobe Creative Cloud integrations
- Non-email based communication
- Dynamic intake forms
I talk about these key features in greater detail in my new article: 10 Must-Haves for Creative Project Management Software. Check it out—I hope it’s helpful!
